EDMONTON — Ryan Nugent-Hopkins knew it would be painful to watch, but he couldn’t resist the urge.
Having just missed a glorious chance after receiving a beautiful feed from linemate Leon Draisaitl on a two-on-one late in the first period, Nugent-Hopkins spent a moment during the intermission trying to figure out what went wrong.
“I don’t want to dwell on it at the moment, but I did watch it after,” he said. “I settled it because I knew I had some time. That ended up biting me in the butt. Just as I went to shoot it, it just kind of went up on edge.”
Had he just blasted in the pass, the Edmonton Oilers would have scored their third unanswered of the opening frame and been on cruise control. That annoyed him more than anything else.
And so, he went to work to make amends.
With the Oilers on a power play eight minutes into the second, Nugent-Hopkins glided to the right post behind Kings defencemen Vladislav Gavrikov and Matt Roy. He got to the crease and planted himself there.
That presented a massive target for Draisaitl’s next pass attempt and an easy tap-in goal for Nugent-Hopkins, the Oilers’ fourth straight marker in a convincing 7-4 win in Game 1.
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“The one that I missed maybe would have been the easiest one, too,” he said, laughing. “I told him to give me one more and I won’t do that again.
“There’s no such thing as a freebie in his league. You need to make sure you get to the right spots and bear down when you get a chance.”
There’s something about some comic relief and all being well that ends well.
Really though, finishing off that second Draisaitl setup was very much needed for Nugent-Hopkins.
Nugent-Hopkins posted unbelievable offensive numbers last season with 37 goals and 104 points. It was a remarkable breakout considering he was 29 — he turned 30 days before the playoffs — and had never surpassed the 30-goal or 70-point marks in any of his first 11 NHL campaigns.
To expect him to replicate that production would have been unfair given his track record and that the Oilers led the NHL with 325 goals scored and had the most prolific power play in league history.
But Nugent-Hopkins’ offence didn’t just dip, it cratered — albeit closer to his career norms.
Nugent-Hopkins had 67 points in 80 games. He recorded just 18 goals — the fifth-lowest rate of any season in his career based on the 0.23 per-game average. The worst part of that downturn was how things wrapped up over the final weeks into the playoffs. He scored twice in his last 25 games — one on the power play and one into an empty net. He hadn’t netted a five-on-five goal since Feb. 26.
Scoring on the two-on-one sure would have been nice to end that drought.
“I don’t think it has anything to do with what’s happened in the past,” Nugent-Hopkins said. “I wanted to bear down and it’s part of the game. Things like that happen.”
Even though Nugent-Hopkins has struggled to score of late, namely at five-on-five, there’s a saving grace: It’s that Nugent-Hopkins is, well, Nugent-Hopkins. His goal total and late-season scarcity of them are way down the list of worries for anyone with the Oilers.
“It’s not a concern,” Oilers coach Kris Knoblauch said. “He’s been very beneficial to our team.
“I would have liked the puck to have gone in the net (for him) a little more. But I also know a lot of it is due to luck. I never thought in my mind that, because Ryan wasn’t scoring, he wasn’t helping our team or contributing. He’s been doing so many things to help our team succeed.”
It’s a long list.
Nugent-Hopkins is part of an immensely successful power play, which was fourth in the NHL and went 3-for-4 in Game 1. He’s often the first forward over the boards for penalty kills. He received the most short-handed ice time among forwards during the season. He’s a fixture in the top six and acts as the defensive conscience of whatever line he’s on. Two potentially game-saving backchecks within a week — at home against St. Louis on Feb. 28 and at Boston on March 5 — were prime illustrations.
“Everybody wants to score and get their confidence going,” veteran Adam Henrique said. “Everybody likes to talk about the goals, but playing a complete game is just as important.
“He’s a 200-foot player. He makes so many little plays all over the ice that end up in scoring chances or goals for us. His skill level is up there with the best in the league. At the same time, you can see his commitment to the defensive side of the puck as well.”
All that is true. Still, a few goals wouldn’t hurt.
Knoblauch noted how the water usually flows from a tap once it’s turned on when it comes to one goal begetting more. That’s what happened with Ryan McLeod and Connor Brown earlier this season, he pointed out.
“It’s amazing what happens when a player puts the puck in the net and what it does for their game,” Knoblauch said. “When they score, they feel like they can do it again immediately after.”
The Oilers will undoubtedly be in good shape if the same thing occurs with Nugent-Hopkins.
He scored six goals in 16 games in the 2022 playoffs as the Oilers reached the Western Conference final. The series against the Calgary Flames could have turned on its head had he not netted the winner late in the third period of Game 4 considering Mike Smith had allowed a long-range shot from Rasmus Andersson less than six minutes earlier. That goal was on the shortlist of the most important of the run.
But Nugent-Hopkins scored just once in 12 contests in last year’s playoffs, part of an underwhelming personal and team performance.
He’s a year older and a year wiser now. Monday was his 50th NHL postseason game.
Even if he feels a need to briefly look back and analyze failed shots, it’s more about finding a way to move on and successfully convert them the next time to help his team.
“It’s about what you do next, the next shift, and continuing moving on,” Nugent-Hopkins said. “There’s opportunities that you miss, and you score on the next shift or the same shift. It’s about refocusing.”
(Photo: Andy Devlin / NHLI via Getty Images)
